Why You Shouldn’t Settle for Cookie-Cutter Marketing

When shopping for a marketing partner, comparing and contrasting what services you are buying into should be a huge part of making your decision.

And while some marketing agencies will try and get you to buy a one-size-fits-all service, no matter your size, industry, or actual needs, there is no reason you should settle for that.

The Case for Custom Digital Marketing

So why should you invest in custom-made marketing instead of a cookie-cutter package? Keep on reading to learn about all the different ways that custom marketing makes a difference.

Your Competitors Are a Huge Influence

Before you start any marketing campaign, you have to know who you are up against.

There are various factors you need to consider in doing analysis of your competitors’ online presence vs. your website. Here are some things you should make sure the marketing agency you partner with looks at:

Ranking – How do you rank compared to your competitors?

Location – Where are your competitors located?

Backlinks – What do other companies’ backlink profiles look like?

Content – What types of pages do competitors have on their websites?

Structure – How do competitor sites compare on a technical level?

Social media – How are your competitors engaging with their customers?

Not All Industries Are the Same

If you buy into a prepacked platform, you might not be getting the correct type of marketing your business needs.

For example, restaurants would benefit from a strategy that is more focused on social media since that is how they attract most customers, compared to a business that is a niche manufacturer, which likely wouldn’t need social media marketing at all.

Location Matters

Where is your business located and what city are you trying to rank in?

These are two important questions to consider when doing marketing, as various business types can face different difficulties based on the amount of competitors around them.

For example, here is the difference when I search for “HVAC” in downtown Cleveland compared to a neighboring suburb:

Downtown

Suburb

Where you are located affects not only your rankings, but also the demand of business in your area, so it is important that you work with an agency that has knowledge of local marketing and can be honest about its setbacks.

Search Volume Is Important

To piggyback off of the last paragraph, your marketing strategy will really need to vary based on where you are trying to rank, locally vs. nationally.

If you are trying to rank in a local market, then it could be that search volume for some of your key terms could be very low, especially for long-tail keywords.You can use the Google Ads keyword planner not just for PPC, but also to test out a few of your SEO keywords. Here is an example using “metal stamping” in Cleveland vs. nationally:

8,100 monthly searches nationally

70 monthly searches in Cleveland

With information like this in tow, you can decide whether to target specific terms locally or nationally.